it down; or else he must needs suffer wrong and injury. Indeed, it is far less injustice to take away any private man's inheritance, than to deprive a sovereign magistrate of that authority, which God and man, law and succession, and all the titles we can have here on earth, have instated in him. And the iniquity is so much the greater, inasmuch as virtually all other rights are lost. and destroyed when his is; all others being derived from his, and depending upon it.

This, therefore, is the Second particular We must not strike princes, in their Authority; either by denying obedience unto it, or deposing them from it.

iii. If this be iniquity, then certainly it is sacrilege TO STRIKE THEM IN THEIR PERSONS, AND TO OFFER VIOLENCE TO THEIR LIBERTY OR LIFE.

They are sacred, as they bear the impress of God's similitude stamped upon them; which whoso violates, is sacrilegious. God hath clothed them with majesty and power; and, whatsoever they are as to virtue and religion, though some of them may be Devils for their morals, yet they are Gods for their dominion. And the Great God, who is their only King and Ruler, hath bestowed upon them the fellowship of that high name: Ps. lxxxii. 6. I have said, Ye are gods: and, v. 1. He judgeth among the gods. So, Exod. xxii. 28. Thou shalt not revile the gods, nor curse the ruler of thy people: this prohibition respects not the Heathenish Gods, who were indeed but devils; and no reproach could be injurious to them: but thou shalt not revile the gods, who are the rulers of thy people; for it reflects a high disparagement and indignity upon the only true God, to abuse his image, and affront that authority which is the nearest type and resemblance of his own. And therefore when David, who was designed to the next succession in the kingdom, cut off but the skirt of Saul's garment, (who was his sworn and implacable enemy, and sought his destruction by all unworthy means) though he did it without intending any hurt to his person or contempt to his authority, but only that he might produce it as a pledge and evidence of his innocence; yet it is said, that his heart smote him for it, because he had approached too near to majesty with any other design than to serve and venerate it. What then shall we think of those, who durst cut off not only the skirt, but the Sacred Head of a sovereign prince, and

stretch forth their bloody hands against the Lord's Anointed? certainly, we never heard that their hearts smote them for it; or that they ever testified the least remorse for so horrid and impious a crime: yea, they died glorying that they had done it; and seemed not only to have peace, but to be full of raptures and ecstatic joys in the assurance of a glorious reward for it : which yet is so far from being a justification of their horrid wickedness, that we may rather think they had sinned and were hardened past repentance. And, as for our late conspirators, they were altogether as bloody, though not so ceremonial as the former: they had prepared their instruments of death, culled out a select number of assassins, chosen the place on which to take their stand to the greatest advantage both for success and secresy; and now nothing wanted, but that the breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the Lord, had fallen in their snares, but only a few days and a favourable providence: but God, whose care sovereign princes are, and among them ours in a more especial and peculiar manner, by a wonderful providence (which his majesty himself hath thankfully acknowledged in his Declaration) defeated their designs, and after brought to light their hellish villainy: and, though they were unsuccessful, yet were they not less guilty, than if their execrable attempt had taken the same effect that hell and their own wicked hearts had desired; for whosoever designs to strike his prince, whether he hit or miss, murders his own soul.

And thus I have shewn you how princes are stricken; in their reputation, by slanderous tongues; in their authority, by denying subjection to it or endeavouring to depose them from it; and, lastly, in their persons, by violence and murder: and how damnable and destructive each of these ways of striking princes is: It is not good to strike princes.

III. The third and last branch of my text yet remains: and that is, the CAUSE, MOTIVE, or PROVOCATION to this abominable and damnable action; and that is, Equity: It is not good....to strike princes for Equity.

These words may admit of a double interpretation: for we may understand them, either of the princes', or the subjects' equity and to strike for either, is here censured as a heinous crime.

i. To strike princes for Equity, may be understood of RESISTING AND REBELLING AGAINST THEM FOR THEIR OWN EQUITY; and the execution of that justice, which is committed to them.

When a prince shall duly execute the righteous and known laws of his land, and suffer for so doing by his powerful and factious subjects; when he shall punish any of them for doing evil, and thereby exasperate them to take revenge; when he shall zealously maintain God's worship and service in the stated and regular way, and thereby incense the ignorant and wayward multitude to rise against government itself as superstition, and to pull down kings as idols: this is to be stricken for equity; for the doing of that, which is just and right. And it is a most provoking crime in the sight of God; for it is no less than rebellion against him: for, as resisting and wronging an inferior officer commissioned by the king, is virtually and interpretatively the same disobedience, as if it were done against the king in person; so, likewise, to resist and injure kings and supreme magistrates in the execution of their righteous laws, is virtually the same affront, as if we rose up against God, and struck immediately at him; for they receive their commission from him, and are his viceroys and vicegerents on earth.

Now, though this sense of the words carries in it a great truth, yet I do not think it the most proper import of them in this place; and that, because this is the very same with punishing the just, from which striking of princes for equity seems to be made distinct.

-ii. Therefore, the striking of princes for equity, may be understood of STRIKING THEM FOR THEIR SUBJECTS' EQUITY: that is, it is a great iniquity to strike princes, upon any pretences of equity and justice in so doing.

Never yet was there any insurrection against the lawful magistrate, but what was prefaced with glorious pretences; the honour of God, the liberty of the subject, a due freedom for tender consciences, the thorough reformation of abuses in Church and State, the establishing of the ordinances of Jesus Christ in power and purity which, indeed, are all of them as excellent things, as any design of man can reach; and we can never too much prosecute them, while we do it in a lawful and allowed manner.

But, what! must we therefore level kings and kingdoms to the ground; and cast down, by right or wrong, whatsoever we

fancy stands in our way to these blessed ends? No; God forbid! for, though our end may be equity, and truth, and justice, and holiness; yet it is iniquity to strike princes for equity. A good purpose can never justify a wicked action; and God abhors that our sins should be made the means of his glory.

Yet, certainly, there is no one topic, which doth more prevail upon weak minds, than this. Persuade them once to believe, that they are like to be wronged in the dearest of all their concerns, their religion or their property; that Popery will overthrow the one, and Arbitrary Government the other: and; there needs no other ferment to make them work over into sedition and tumults; to shake, and, if they can, overthrow the established government, which indeed is the surest defence against both.

Arbitrary Government is, in truth, a hard word; and a much harder thing: and I am verily persuaded, that many men have learned to speak it by rote, who understand nothing at all what it signifies: and it may mean Classical or Synodal, for ought: they know; and I am sure with much better correspondence. than as they usually apply it. In short, arbitrary government is a government managed by the sole will and pleasure of the ruler, without the direction and prescript of laws. But have. they any reason to fear this? was there ever any prince, who, in all his public transactions, hath kept himself more precisely to the rules of the established and known laws, than ours hath done? hath he ever sought, by force and violence, to push on: his designs; or to redress those intolerable affronts and injuries, which have been done him by some of his petulant subjects, by any other means than recourse to the laws? yea, and in those just and mild proceedings, he hath met with such hard and perverse measures, that he had reason to complain, as it is said he once did, that none within his dominions were denied justice,. but himself. So that this pretence of Arbitrary Power and Arbitrary Government, is nothing but a bugbear; invented to fright the people first from their wits, and then from their allegiance. And, let me add, that, of all men in the world, those, who, by such wicked arts and bloody enterprizes, sought the subversion of the government, ought least of all to have objected this: for, as their vile attempts were utterly against law; so, had they succeeded in them, no doubt their sway, and management of their usurped power, would have been most

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arbitrary, and squared by no other law than their own will and pleasure.

And, for the coming in of Popery, I must confess, I dread it as much as they; and, I think, upon better grounds. For I not only know the restless industry, the crafty artifices, the formidable power and interest of that Antichristian Party, who have with the greatest application endeavoured, in one continued series, to reduce that rotten religion again into these nations, ever since it was first expelled out of them: but that, which gives me the most troublesome apprehension, is, the helpinghand, which those lend to bring it back again, who yet seem to cry out loudest, That it is coming in. Are these men fit to keep out Popery, who do what they can, by their factions, schisms, seditions, and conspiracies, to make Protestantism odious; and act so, as if it were their design to demonstrate to the world, that we must be either Papists or Rebels? nay, as if it were their design to baffle all popish plots and detestable treasons, by striving to outdo them? What shall I say? it is a lamentation, and it shall be for a lamentation, that these men, who pretend to be at the greatest distance from Popery, and who are ready to call all others Papists but themselves; yet do their work for them more effectually, than all the emissaries of Rome or of hell could have done. And yet, I hope that our God hath not utterly abandoned the small remains of his true Reformed Church among us; and that, notwithstanding all the advantages which these men have given to the common adversaries, not only to reproach but to persuade and prevail, he will yet, in his infinite mercy, find out expedients to preserve his true religion free, both from Romish idolatry and fanatical confusion. In the which hope, I am the more encouraged by the wonderful preservation of his Majesty from the two hellish conspiracies, both of Popish and Antimonarchical Plotters; as also, by his pious care of settling the succession of his crown upon princes of Protestant Families and Profession: which whosoever shall seriously consider, can never be induced to believe otherwise, than that the sincere intention and earnest desire of his Majesty and of the government, is to maintain the true Orthodox Protestant Religion, as it is at present established.

But; if God should, for our great sins; and, among them, our carnal distrust and jealousy, fears of dangers, and wicked arts to prevent them; set open the mouth of the bottomless pit,